


Veneer

by TinyFakeFanficRock



Series: The Maisie Files [2]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout: New Vegas
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-20
Updated: 2017-01-20
Packaged: 2018-09-18 19:55:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9400694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TinyFakeFanficRock/pseuds/TinyFakeFanficRock
Summary: Right question, wrong place.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written for the Fallout Kink Meme.

Maisie was a bright girl, but the bullets to her head had left her something of a tabula rasa, and she often needed background filled in. Ordinarily this was fine by Arcade; he liked having the opportunity to be someone's fount of knowledge, and Maisie always listened eagerly to his pontification. Since their travels in the Mojave threw a lot of information at her, often all at once, it was sometimes days between when someone mentioned something and when she got around to asking him about it. And ordinarily this too was fine by Arcade; he just wished she'd thought up this particular question anywhere but in the main terminal of Camp McCarran.

"Arcade? What's the Enclave?"

"What?" He walked a little faster, wondering if they could be out of the compound before he had to say anything of substance, his mind racing all the while. _How much to tell her? Nothing would be safest, obviously, but I don't think she'd believe I don't know anything about them after all the showing-off I've done. Besides, after those little fiascos at the Silver Rush and that downed Vertibird, I really don't want her to pick up on the common thread of all the things I don't want to talk about._

"The Enclave. That thing Ignacio mentioned back at HELIOS One. He said the tech there reminded him of Enclave equipment."

Right, Rivas _had_ said that, and Arcade had hoped she'd forget it. He shouldn't have gotten his hopes up; if technology was involved, or even any small moving parts, Maisie was interested. She had the soul of a tinker. A tinker who was going to get him shot. He picked up his pace again and pushed through the doors, blinking back the rush of sunlight.

She grabbed his sleeve. "Hey, slow down, long legs. I'm not running to keep up with you if we're not in a hurry. Which we're not ... right?"

Damn, damn, damn. He was not very good at this at all, he admitted to himself, and if she was going to keep dragging him into dangerous places, -- _which of course she is, because fish swim, birds fly, and Maisie gets us into trouble,_ \-- he really needed to develop an unflappable nature, or at least the veneer of one. "I guess not."

"So are you gonna tell me about the Enclave or what?"

It took all his self-restraint not to demand that she stop saying that word. Maisie wasn't particularly loud, but people tended to pay attention to her. And attention was the last thing he wanted anywhere near him at the same time as the word _Enclave_. Especially with First Recon so close that even drunk and blindfolded, they could turn his head into red mist. _And instant death is the nicest possible outcome here._

He gave her the briefest outline he dared. "They were influential people, mostly connected to the government before the war. They set up a few places kind of like the Vaults, where they hoarded supplies, including Pre-War energy weapons, power armor, experimental prototypes, those kinds of things. That's the stuff Rivas was referring to."

The gears in her head -- _heh, she's a gearhead, all right_ \-- were obviously whirring. "Awesome. Where would we get our hands on some of that?"

This had to be a trap. She'd already figured out his secret, and the goal of this was to get him to confess within the NCR's hearing. That or she was trying to give him a heart attack. "We wouldn't," he told her flatly. "And even if we could, you wouldn't want it."

She stopped. He fought down the urge to scream, or to throw her over his shoulder and run the remaining twenty feet to the exit. "Hell yes, I would, if it's that advanced. Where do I join up?"

Arcade put on his most patient voice, the one he knew she hated because she thought he was talking down to her. Maybe that would shut down the discussion. "Maisie, they thought they were the only real humans in the Wasteland. They would not accept you, and you should not want to join them, no matter how many shiny toys they had, because they obtained them by exploiting, enslaving, torturing, and murdering countless innocents. They were evil people."

_They did evil things, but they weren't necessarily evil people, and you know it,_ part of him chided. He snapped back at it, _Look, you can have all the nuance you want when we're not up to our neck in NCR troopers. Right now, let's just try to survive, hmm?_

Beside him, she was silent for a moment, then said, "So where do I go to kill them and take their whole shiny toybox?"

"The NCR beat you to it. They rounded up everyone in the Enclave and executed them." _Yes, good, they're all dead. Past tense. Definitely no survivors anywhere. Especially not in the Mojave. Double-especially not standing right the hell in the middle of Camp McCarran._

"So that means the NCR has all their stockpiles now. And they owe me a few favors." Maisie's eyes were dangerously alight, but at least she was moving again, pushing up the sliding door. "I wonder who would know where all that stuff went?"

Arcade could take no more of this. "You puzzle that one out; I'm going to run across the street to the motel and use the facilities before we move on."

"So _that's_ why you were in such a hurry. Stop swiping my sarsaparilla and you won't have that problem."

Before she could say anything else, he darted across the street, shut himself in one of the motel rooms, slumped against the wall, and tried to have his nervous breakdown as quietly as possible. One way or another, she was going to be the death of him.


End file.
